Chapter 408: Who Exactly Died

Chapter 408: Chapter 408: Who Exactly Died

As for the wound, if Catherine Miller hadn’t pointed it out, Eliza might have just assumed it was inflicted during the fight.

Eliza Lynch, who had been fairly certain before, was now in a bit of a panic. ’Could it be... that my husband is the one who’s dead?’

The lead captain frowned, then raised a hand, signaling one of his officers to check the deceased’s arm.

Soon, the officer returned with an answer. "The deceased has a similar wound on his arm. Visually, it looks about the same as the suspect’s."

Everyone’s heart sank. This meant they would need more evidence to prove that Marcus Thompson was Marcus Thompson, and Kai Thorne was Kai Thorne.

"Take him in. Leave two men to secure the scene, and don’t let any unauthorized personnel in to contaminate it!" the captain ordered the officers around him. He then hurried off with his team toward the police station.

But on the way back, the captain’s brow was tightly furrowed.

The department’s workload was already at capacity. Everyone was buried in cases, and there was simply no one to spare for this one.

But this was a homicide. It couldn’t be delayed.

The captain began to wonder if anyone’s caseload could be shifted to someone else. But after running through everyone in his mind, he realized all their cases were urgent. No one had any time to spare.

’Forget it, I’m not going to stress about it,’ he thought. ’I’ll just dump the problem on the Chief when I get back and let him deal with the headache.’

The captain cast aside his worries and got everyone back to the station as quickly as possible.

After returning to the station, the captain explained the current situation to the Chief and admitted frankly that they had no one available to handle the case.

The Chief considered this for a moment, then told the captain to proceed with the standard interrogation and leave the rest to him.

When the captain was done and went to find the Chief again, he was told the case had been submitted for reassignment. The Chief told him to organize the clues they’d just gathered and pass them along as well.

Subsequently, the case landed in the hands of the captain of Team Two, who came to see the Chief about it.

After reviewing the entire statement and the course of events, the Chief rubbed his chin, his expression grave.

Marcus Thompson had likely been planning to take his brother’s place from the beginning, spending the last six months altering his appearance to resemble him.

Kai Thorne had a bit of a hard life as a child, but after his adoptive parents became successful, they doted on him. He never experienced any real hardship, so he had no scars on his body.

The same was true for Marcus Thompson. While Mr. and Mrs. Thompson were alive, they compensated for their guilt over the other child by doubling down on their affection for their eldest son.

Though the family struggled financially, Marcus also never did much manual labor. After he grew up, got married, and had children, he was only responsible for earning money outside the home and never touched the housework. Naturally, his hands and body were free of marks.

Although Marcus later received several cuts on his hand when he was threatened over unpaid gambling debts, Kai Thorne now had identical marks. The wounds on the deceased’s hand had even been cut over again, likely to prevent police from determining the time of the original injury.

However, Marcus had underestimated modern forensic technology. Given enough time, the medical examiner would be able to detect two different sets of wounds and use that to determine which one was the real Marcus Thompson.

After mentally summarizing the case, the Chief was lost in thought. ’Who would be the best fit for this case?’

’Team Two?’

The next second, the Chief recalled the dark circles under the Team Two captain’s eyes and the hurried pace of his officers.

’No, no. Team Two has enough on their plate. No need to add to their workload.’

’Team Three is also a no-go. They’re at a critical point in a major case.’

After much deliberation, the Chief realized he would have to give it to Zoe Sawyer and her team. They were the only ones who could spare the manpower right now.

As for the group they’d arrested today, they could be held and interrogated separately. The remaining officers could be on standby to go and arrest the "big brother" they mentioned.

The Chief ran through the decision in his mind, felt it was a solid plan, and picked up the case file. He then headed for the office of Zoe Sawyer and her team.

"Here’s a case. Everyone else is swamped and can’t handle it, so I need you all to help share the load." The Chief placed the file he was holding on the desk in front of Zoe Sawyer.

"Understood, Chief. Don’t worry," Zoe Sawyer said, nodding readily without hesitation.

Heath Hale and the others also nodded. It was just another case. Their team did have a bit more manpower than the other two, so taking on a little extra was no big deal.

Soon, Zoe and her team had reviewed the file.

"Suspect appears to be mentally unstable due to severe trauma?" Zoe Sawyer stared at that sentence in the report, her expression turning grave.

’That’s an interesting line,’ she thought. ’Is he genuinely overwhelmed by the shock and can’t cope, or is he trying to use this to evade interrogation and hide something?’

These were key points and would be the focus of their investigation.

"Real or not, we’ll find out once we go see for ourselves," Heath Hale said, standing up and motioning for Zoe Sawyer and Hayden Shaw to follow him.

At the same time, Heath also arranged for a few officers to head to the crime scene and to the study where Kai Thorne had supposedly stayed for two days without leaving, to see if they could find anything.

Soon, the three of them saw Catherine Miller, her two children, Eliza Lynch, and her daughter in the reception room.

Chloe Thompson was coaxing the two younger children to play off to one side, leaving space for Heath and the others to conduct the interview.

"Mrs. Lynch, please tell us everything that happened after Kai Thorne returned home, from beginning to end," Heath Hale said, looking at the file in his hands.

Eliza Lynch’s brow furrowed. ’I already told them everything from beginning to end back there. Why do I have to say it all again?’

"Didn’t I already say this? A week ago, Kai Thorne suddenly told me his twin brother had contacted him again. He said the two of them wanted to reconnect. After that, he was out all the time, coming home late reeking of alcohol and smoke.

"Before we got married, I made it clear that I hate smoking and drinking. Kai was always good about it and never touched either. But in those last few days, he did both. I was so angry I took our child and went back to my parents’ house.

"By the time I came back, this had already happened. I told Kai not to touch anything, then went to find Catherine Miller so we could call the police together." Eliza Lynch repeated her story impatiently. As she finished, she shot Catherine a look of clear disgust.

In her eyes, that whole family was nothing but a bunch of parasites.

If she had her way, she would never have anything to do with those people for the rest of her life.

"Again?" Heath Hale sharply picked up on that word. He looked at Eliza Lynch, his gaze probing. "Why ’again’? The deceased and the suspect look alike. They should have noticed something was off the first time they met. Why would they only think of ’reconnecting’ after meeting again?

"Did some sort of conflict happen during their first meeting?"

At this, Catherine Miller instinctively flinched, looking guilty. The movement was caught by Hayden Shaw, who was standing to the side.

"Ms. Miller, do you know the reason?"